happy pride, etc

[papadopoulos]

“Uh, people were killed.”
“No one was killed at Stonewall.”
“No…body…was killed???”
_________________________________________________________

The café is looking much more colorful than it has in the past. Specifically, there are various flags draped on top of the walls – certainly it is much brighter than anything Enjolras would have cared to come up with. Directly behind the pastry case there is a rainbow flag, and scattered around there are a myriad of other pride flags. (Whatever they could scrounge up from the cupboards, basically.) There is also a small table set off to one side, with various types of beaded necklaces and colored bracelets lying atop it. There is also a small flier with descriptions and explanations of what the different flags represent. Explanations of pride in general will be freely offered, as well.

Dionysus has offered up his cd player, though instead of the same music from the party, it is playing songs from various queer artists. There’s a selection ranging from Bowie to Cole Porter to Billie Holiday, including more modern artists such as Lady Gaga, Mika, Queen, and Green Day. Apollo can be found near the music as usual; but he is currently engrossed in making more of the colored bracelets. He is seated at the table with a box full of friendship bracelet making supplies, wearing an artfully cropped version of this shirt, a hyacinth bloom set behind his ear. Dionysus is at a different table, wearing a knee-length sundress of pink, yellow, and blue stripes and one of the beaded bracelets Apollo is making, this one in yellow, white, purple, and black beads. He found a small facepainting palette with a few pride flag options and is willing to offer up his services if anyone happens to want a tiny flag on their cheek (or, well, wherever.)


Let us know if you want Apollo, Dionysus, or both for your threads!

Comments

[temnota]

"I know people have preferences but I confess that I have never understood picking one over the other," Aleksander mused as he perched on the edge of the table. "The world is large and the variations of people are infinite. Why limit yourself?"

[wickedwit]

Claudius chokes back a sob. Oh, he thinks. There it is. The tonic Dionysus gave me must be taking effect. It feels awful but only because everything is awful. His body feels tired. His eyes feel wet. His heart feels utterly empty, and yet crushed with pain. "I don't want to lose what we have here," he says. It feels so frustratingly petty and small. "I love this place. I love the astonishing variety of people who come through here. I love ..." He almost laughs. "I love listening to someone badly explain one of their celebrations, the same way I loved to walk through cities where I only half knew the language, and learned it as I went. But what if I was only ever meant to live out a tragedy?"

[papadopoulos]

Apollo shrugs again. "Because people like to get into arguments about moralities and that sort of thing? I don't get it, either."

[onthewillowsthere]

He brings his hands to his cheeks and pats them very lightly, feeling out the texture of dry paint. When he says, "Thank you," he signs it too, thank you so much, his hands more expressive than his face can be.

After a hesitation he adds would you like a scone?

[vineleaves]

"Oh, well naturally. Wouldn't be properly scientific if we didn't."

[vineleaves]

Dionysus thinks of so many prophecies that came true regardless of what people thought would set them free. Laius believing he would not be killed, because he was certain his child had been abandoned to die, then later that same child believing he would not fulfil his side of the prophecy because he left Corinth. That's the whole point of a prophecy. They're going to come true.

But a play is not a prophecy. And even if it were, Dionysus is pretty sure Laius would have lived if Oedipus had been teleported to the mansion. That's clearly something that neither him nor Apollo can foresee, as evidenced by the fact that they were both taken by surprise at arriving here.

"I think you're here so that you don't live out a tragedy," he says, with full confidence. "The same way Étienne and Mercutio are here to be saved from death, the same way my brother is here to escape our father, the same way I'm here to give you monologues to learn and to make sure everyone had enough vitamins to make it through the winter."

He boops Claudius's nose, you know, for old time's sake.

"I'm not going to pretend I understand everything that's going on with this place. Anything that's powerful enough to keep me trapped -- not to mention Apollo -- that's weird. But I can't imagine they'd want to bring us all here if the plan was to have us live the same kinds of lives we all had to deal with before. If that were the case why even bring us to start with?"

[vineleaves]

Dionysus grins. Galahad is so darling.

Yes please! I would love one! Thank you!

[wickedwit]

It's a true, in a way Claudius can't deny. He works through a sleepy logic of it, nestling against Dionysus's shoulder, "If the spirits truly chose us from stories they loved, they could easily read the same stories over and over. They wanted new entertainment. Something different. I suppose for someone with a tragic fate, anything different would be better." A little sulkily, as though to concede in some imagined debate with the mansion's spirit, he says, "I am glad Étienne is here. I'm rather hopelessly in love with him, and it grieves me to think he might have died so young. And Mercutio is a feckless bear-baiter of a young man, but I like him. I'm teaching him alchemical reactions, and he's going to bring me back gossip from his flirtations." All future things. Things that aren't the chasm of his own hopelessness stretching on and on, forever. He can almost touch the other side.

[onthewillowsthere]

He leans over and retrieves the basket of black raspberry and ginger scones, and offers it to Dionysus.

[lanselos_du_lac]

"I see. I knew not there was a word for it." He does seem relieved.

[vineleaves]

Thank you! He takes a scone from the basket and takes a big bite. It's so good!

[vineleaves]

"Oh, I didn't show you when we came in," he says, as if they hadn't been dealing with Crisis Mode when they first entered Dionysus' room, "Étienne painted that for me." He points up to Ariadne's constellation on the ceiling. "Actually, I suppose you might have heard about it already, your sweet Galahad gave him the idea. They knew how much I was missing my wife's stars and took matters into their own hands to make things better for me." A sigh, then he adds quietly, "...I love him so much."

Étienne, not Galahad. Obviously.

"Whatever the downsides to this place are, we can work together to make it better. To make it bearable for each other. More than bearable. You're getting married, for goodness sake. There is so much happiness to go around."

[onthewillowsthere]

The smile lasts less than a second, a firefly-light of a smile, but it was definitely there. I like practicing. And tasting things.

[papadopoulos]

"I've got tons of stories," Apollo replies cheerfully. "So it's a date." When? Whenever, he guesses. It's not like they're short on time here.

[papadopoulos]

For Apollo's part, marriage isn't his thing. He swore a long time ago that he would not marry unless it was Daphne, and we all saw how that turned out. He sighs, and nods. "I get it. A lot of people don't view it kindly nowadays, either. It's hard, but that's part of the reason why this celebration exists."

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji, still holding that informational sheet in both hands, nods, very serious. He folds the paper crisply in half and tucks it into his sleeve. He will hang onto this and show it to Wei Ying. Wei Ying will like the idea of this Pride -- a protest and a celebration, a show of defiance. "Thank you," he says to Apollo, with sincerity.

[kadewest]

Kade is pretty sure Apollo doesn't mean it like a date-date, but there are enough men here who have hit on him that he feels beholden to say, "Sure, sure. As a reminder, though, I am hopelessly straight."

[wickedwit]

There's an aching, in the emptiness of Claudius's chest -- the emptiness Claudius created by vacating his body, but it must not have worked, because there's something there that can be hurt. He tries to grasp it, tries to imagine the wedding day, but after the loss of Shen Yuan nothing is certain. "How canst thou bear it?" He asks, looking up at the stars of the ceiling, put there by two men he loves for the god he adores. "How canst thou bear all the losses thou hast had?" Is he looking at the answer, while looking at those stars? He finds he can't look away. That aching in his chest starts to feel like bitter hope.

[vineleaves]

"It's hard," he answers truthfully. "Sometimes I'll be going about my day, and something someone says, or the way the light hits their hair, or a look they give, or just -- well, anything, really. It'll remind me of Ariadne, or one of my children, or Ampelos, or any number of friends. But those are the moments when I get to remember them, too. I wouldn't trade my happy memories for anything in the world."

One hand travels down to Claudius's chest, to rest above his heart. "Grief means you had someone worth missing. To block it out entirely is to deny yourself the chance to remember the good, too."

[wickedwit]

"Wilt thou remember the good of me?" he asks, soft. He'd accepted the likelihood that he'd died before his first and closest friends, sometimes driven by the fear that a mortal life wasn't enough to do any significant good for them in. Now Shen Yuan the immortal has died, and he can't trust the likelihood of anything. He can trust, right now, in the fact Dionysus's hand on his heart. In the stars and the memories that Dionysus still carries.

[vineleaves]

“Oh, darling,” Dionysus gives Claudius a kiss. “The gods themselves couldn’t make me forget all the good in you.” It would sound like hyperbole if he wasn’t himself also a god.

[papadopoulos]

"Or maybe we'll have to try it without someone's boyfriend involved."

[futaille]

"Well, if you think about it, who isn't someone's boyfriend?"

[wickedwit]

"Imagine the parable," Claudius says, a flicker of brightness in his eyes, the fleeting shine of a smile at the end of a kiss. "The villain of a celebrated tragedy meets the god of theater, who promises always to remember the good in him. I could worship no god but thee, know'st thou."

[papadopoulos]

"Well, if you have any other questions, we can try and answer them."